Mortification

By Fr. Conor Donnelly

(Proofread)

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask your pardon for my sins and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

We read in today's Gospel: “But I say to you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that have nothing more that they can do. But I will show you whom you shall be afraid of: be afraid of him who after he has killed has power to cast into hell” (Luke 12:4-5).

This passage is telling us about the passing nature of the human body, and that we don't need to be too worried about him who might kill the body. But we need to be much more concerned about him who could kill the soul, because the soul is immortal. The soul is going to live forever.

It's a passage that in a subtle sort of way tells us about the care of our soul. All through the Gospels, Our Lord reminds us of the care of our soul and one of the dangers is that our soul can be dominated a little bit by the body.

So we have to keep the body in check. That process is called mortification, mortis facere, to make death, to die to ourselves.

Jesus said to His disciples: “If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Matt. 16:24).

Our Lord speaks a lot about self-denial—the importance of self-denial—saying no to self, to our appetites, to our tendencies, to our likes and dislikes, to our whims. We have to try and keep our body in check, and in that way, we train our soul. We are more united to Christ. We look to the cross.

“It makes me happy,” says St. Paul, “to be suffering for you now, and in my own body, to make up for all the hardships that still have to be undergone by Christ for the sake of his body, the Church” (Col. 1:24).

Through dying to ourselves, we unite ourselves to Christ on the Cross. We become more holy, more effective. We allow our soul to breathe.

St. Josemaría used to recommend that we would have a little list of small mortifications, two or three things that we might try and do every day. Not big things, but small things. Things that fit in with our work, that if possible, help us to work a little better, or help us in other ways.

The whole pathway of mortification, according to our spirit, is meant to be in the ordinary things: getting up on time, being on time for different activities, punctuality, order in our cabinet, in our drawers, among our personal things, thinking of others, putting ourselves out in little things.

Eating a little bit less of what we like and a little bit more of what we don't like. Finishing what's on our plate. In that way, thanking God for all the good things that He gives us.

“In all truth I tell you,” says Our Lord in St. John, “unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it yields a rich harvest” (John 12:24).

We die to ourselves in order to yield a rich fruit.

We've come to the Work to die to ourselves, to forget about ourselves, to be that grain of wheat that falls into the ground, so that all the fruits that God wants may come from our life, from our day, from our work, from everything we do.

We could ask Our Lord in our prayer: What little mortifications should I be practicing? Or talk about it in our chat.

How do we practice this spirit of small mortifications? And the important thing is not just the dying to ourselves; not just the sacrifice.

It's the love with which we do it. It's all about love. It's saying no to our body in order to say yes to our soul. God wants us to live that spirit all throughout our life.

Many years ago, in Singapore, I was having lunch with an Irish diocesan priest who was based in New Zealand, but he had come to Singapore for the funeral of his brother. This man was 82.

We were having lunch, and after lunch we had coffee, and I asked him if he wanted some sugar for his coffee.

He said, “No, thanks, I'm off it for Lent.” Okay, that was a very nice thing to say, but I couldn't help thinking that at 82, he was still living a practice of Lent. I was very edified.

The spirit of mortification and small things was very much alive. We live this spirit not just for now, not when we're young, but always. So that sort of mortification is in everything we do.

Sometimes the world gets a bit scandalized by sacrifice or by mortification, but it's a funny thing, because all the greatest athletes in the world undergo an enormous amount of self-denial.

If you look at Eliud Kipchoge, who broke the record for the marathon recently, probably, we only see him in the last hundred meters of the race, breaking the record in all the glory that's there.

We don't see him running over the hills of Eldorette at five o'clock in the morning when it's raining, or keeping on running and going uphill when he doesn't feel like it.

All the great athletes live lives like that—Messi and Usain Bolt. I saw a documentary of Usain Bolt recently, who I think holds the world record for the 100 meters. The amount of training that these people go through is really very heroic.

So, when we feel that we have to deny ourselves little things, it's nothing compared to what these great athletes do.

Self-denial is not an unusual thing. It's highly common. People deny themselves all sorts of things to pass this exam, to get this diploma, to get into this particular school, or all sorts of goals.

What scandalizes people is that if it's done for God, if it's done for others. Doing it for oneself is no problem.

The essence then of what Our Lord invites us to do is to offer these things to Him. It's all based on charity. We say no to ourselves in order to say yes to others, to say yes to love.

That mortification can be more necessary at certain times. There are exterior mortifications, corporal mortifications that we impose on our body, but there are also interior mortifications in our mind, in our imagination, in our heart.

There are passive mortifications that come: changes of plans, things that don't work out the way we wanted them to, something unpleasant. All these things are possibilities for mortification. Forget about ourselves and offer them to Our Lord on the Cross.

Lord, in this particular thing, I offer this thing to you now; in this moment. I say no to myself.

Sometimes God might send us a headache, or a sore toe, or we might not have slept so well last night, or all sorts of things. These are occasions to forget about ourselves and just offer them to Him and in that we can find our peace and our joy.

There's a phrase in the Gospel that can be very helpful. It says, “We receive less blows than we deserve” (cf. Luke 12:48).

“We receive less blows than we deserve.” If on some occasion we feel Our Lord is sending us too many things, too many difficulties or hardships or bad news, or we fail this exam, or this thing doesn't work out, or the machine breaks down at a bad moment, or all these sorts of things, it's good to remember “we receive less blows than we deserve.”

There were many times in our life when maybe, we deserved all the most terrible things that could happen for our lack of honesty, for our lack of punctuality, our lack of order, all the sins we might have committed, all these things.

What Our Lord sends us, really, is very minimal. Mortification lightens the weight of our soul and makes it easier to be lifted up.

While this spirit is something that is meant to pervade our whole existence, there are certain periods in the year which the Church gives us where she encourages us to practice a little more penance: in Lent and Advent.

We start Lent with the ceremony of the ashes, reminding us that we are dust, we're nothing; reminding us of the importance of the soul, that the body is passing.

It's something positive, not something negative, and the essence of our sacrifice is not to destroy, but to offer.

In The Way of the Cross, we're told, “We must bring into our life to make them our own, the life and death of Christ” (Josemaría Escrivá, The Way of the Cross, Fourteenth Station).

We're on a royal pathway. Christ never said it was going to be easy. We bring to our prayer sometimes the Way of the Cross, where we see Christ falling down three times.

But He gets up again. He endured all this suffering for you and me.

When we say no to ourselves, we try to accompany Him along that pathway of the Way of the Cross with generosity, with humility.

St. Josemaría also says, “We must die through mortification and penance, so that Christ can live in us through Love. And then follow in the footsteps of Christ, with a zeal to co-redeem all mankind” (Ibid.).

We mortify ourselves to be more apostolic, to think more of others, to go out of our way, to deny ourselves little pleasures here and there that we offer to Our Lord for this soul and for that soul.

This is the excitement of our life. We live for souls, everything for souls. Everything becomes a motive of joy. “We must give our life for others,” he says. “That is the only way to live the life of Jesus Christ and to become one and the same thing with him” (Ibid.).

In The Way, we’re told: “We must give ourselves in everything, we must deny ourselves in everything: the sacrifice must be a holocaust” (J. Escrivá, The Way, Point 186).

The self-giving of Jesus on the Cross is full of love. Christ is not bitter on the Cross. He's not full of hatred. He doesn't say all these people who put me here on the Cross—He doesn't curse us on the cross. “Thy will be done. Let not my will, rather, yours be done” (Luke 22:42).

Christ loved the Cross because it's the instrument of redemption, of salvation for the whole world. “Greater love than this no man has, that he lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).

One time St. Josemaría was in a get-together in the early 1950s with a number of people. There was going to be a consistory, which is where some people are named cardinals.

One young fellow in the get-together piped up and said: “Father, maybe you'll be made a cardinal!”

St. Josemaría changed the topic very quickly. But after the get-together, he called that fellow to his room. The guy was a doctor.

St. Josemaría lifted up his cassock and then lifted up his shirt and lifted up his undershirt and showed a big red rash that was across his chest.

The young doctor immediately recognized the rash as the rash of Herpes Zoster or shingles. He knew that people with shingles are normally in a lot of pain. Often, they're in bed with a fever and they can be in hospital.

But St. Josemaría was there in the get-together and still nothing was the matter. And St. Josemaría pointed to the red of the rash and he said: “My son, this is the only red that God has in mind for me.”

Eventually that fellow was ordained and at the end of his life was made a cardinal by John Paul II, Cardinal Julián Herranz. He hesitated quite a bit before accepting the nomination as a cardinal, possibly remembering that experience with St. Josemaría.

On another occasion he said he had been sick and in his convalescence St. Josemaría brought him for a drive around Rome with Don Álvaro.

St. Josemaría was laughing and singing and joking in the little Fiat 600 that they had in the early 1950s.

When they went back home, St. Josemaría went upstairs and Don Álvaro hung back a little bit and asked him: “Well, how did you find St. Josemaría this afternoon?”

He said, “Well, he was in great form. He was laughing, he was singing, he was joking.”

He told him: “Well, just for you to know, St. Josemaría has a big boil on the back of his neck because of the diabetes. His Roman collar is biting down into his neck. So he had been in great pain all afternoon. But just for you to know that he did all of this for you.”

“The Father loves me,” said Our Lord, “because I lay down my life in order to take it up again” (John 10:17).

Our bodies can say at times what our heart cannot say. We say with our actions. We show Our Lord with our deeds that we're serious

This deed of self-denial, this saying no to myself in this particular thing, training myself like a great athlete—because Our Lord wants me to be a great champion, a great leader in love, to show the world what charity is.

He wants to use me to be more effective spiritually in this world, which Pope Francis says has a great spiritual emptiness (Pope Francis, Angelus, June 19, 2016). We've come to fill that emptiness.

To live a life of mortification is not such a big thing. Atheists even do it. Atheists do corporal mortification. They go on hunger strikes.

So sometimes we might sleep on the floor, or they might do other things that we do—or just small things really, to try and show Our Lord how much we want to be united to Him.

If we try to practice that corporal mortification, we'll discover the cross in the ordinary things: family circumstances, social situations, work situations.

We might like to work in this particular way, or lay the table in this way, or sweep the floor in this way. But we might be told, “This is a better way to do it” or “This is more efficient.”

We might need to change our work habits, and it might take a little bit of saying no to ourselves in order to learn new things, in order to work better, to be more productive, to sanctify our work a little better, to create a better atmosphere around us.

We might have to mortify our way of doing things, our things we have learned before, because now there's a better way, because we've been lifted up onto a new level.

No matter what things may be there in our life, we are all addicted to something: the laziness, the gossip, the disorder. We all have to fight the battle in many of these areas. But all these things can be overcome.

I was impressed reading a book once by a priest who used to hear Confession in a downtown church in New York, Father Benedict Groeschel. He's written a number of books. He has a statement there that says, “All addictions can be cast out by prayer and sacrifice.”

That's a very powerful statement coming from a priest who hears Confessions in downtown New York where every possible addiction might make itself manifest.

“All addictions can be cast out by prayer and sacrifice.” No matter what we might be addicted to, we can overcome them: anger, envy, jealousy, lust, gluttony. We've come to conquer ourselves.

There's a point in The Way (Point 221) where St. Josemaría says: “If you are generous in voluntary mortification, God will give you the grace to love the trials that he sends you.”

What a great way to live, loving the trials. The key to loving the trials is to be generous in saying no to ourselves.

Often the greatest mortification will be in the ordinary things. Finishing our work well. Persevering in the work begun. Double checking. Very often, perfection is in the details. Double checking the work that we have to do.

One time I was accompanying somebody in a hospital and two ladies came to clean this room. It was a small room with a little bathroom attached.

So, I left the room, and I waited outside until they were finished. They were there for about twenty minutes.

Eventually they came out and I went back into the room. The first thing I saw was a wastepaper basket on top of the table that was full. I wondered what took them so long to clean this fairly small room and small bathroom.

When I walked into the room and saw that wastepaper basket on the table, I got the impression that I think they were spending the whole time talking, If they had just looked back, a small glance as they left the room, they would have seen that wastebasket on top of the table.

Often, perfection in our work is in that second glance. Double check to make sure everything is in its place. The last look.

This is finishing our work well, taking care of the details, not presuming that everything is okay. We type an email or write a little note or something. It's double checking what we've done.

We offer to Our Lord the martyrdom of little things. Putting this thing right, turning off this switch, turning off a light, turning off a tap.

We're told in The Way: “A little act, when done for love, is worth so much!” (J. Escrivá, The Way, Point 814).

Often, it's the difficult things that make us improve. We improve on the uphill climb. If we identify something that we're not so good at or we need to improve on, and we apply ourselves to that, that's a very good mortification.

Tackle this problem, this virtue, this vice, this habit, because I've come to be better. I've come to conquer myself. I've come to be more Christ-like.

If God permits certain crosses in our life, we can thank Him for the crosses. Thank you, Lord, for this contradiction, because it's good.

Or, Thank you Lord for this temptation that seems to cost so much—because through the temptations that God permits, He invites us to a greater fortitude, or a greater faith, or a greater spirit of struggle, or an optimism, or to rely more on His graces, or to look for the source of those graces more frequently.

Sometimes the mortification that Our Lord wants from us is interior mortification: in our mind, in our imagination. Getting rid of bad thoughts, not allowing them to linger. If we think long enough about bad things, those ideas come out as our actions.

If you think long enough about robbing a bank, you'll end up robbing a bank. If we spend our day thinking about how am I going to get into this bank, and how am I going to get the money, and how am I going to get that gun, and start to plan it little by little, one day we'll end up robbing a bank.

If we get thoughts about robbing a bank, we should try and get rid of those thoughts as quickly as possible. They're just a waste of time.

Our imagination can present all sorts of things to our mind. That's why we have to try and control the imagination. In the book Jesus as Friend, there's a whole chapter on imagination. It's often called the madwoman of the house, the imagination.

We can have all sorts of imaginary fears or pains, imagine all sorts of scenarios that have nothing to do with reality. Or we might have thoughts of discouragement, or sensuality, or infidelity, or all sorts of things, or comparisons.

Sometimes we have to calm our imagination. The apostles were in the boat and the storm was raging. Interestingly, Our Lord was asleep in the stern of the boat. They were terrified.

These experienced fishermen had seen many storms. They'd never seen anything like this. They go to Our Lord and say: “Master, does it not concern you that we are perishing?”

Jesus stands up in the boat, speaks to the elements, and says: “Peace, be still” (Mark 4:38-39).

Sometimes that's what we have to say to our thoughts, to our imaginations, maybe running around there inside our head, all full of nonsense.

One great way to put a stop to those sorts of thoughts is to go and talk about them to the person that we chat with. Don't wait for our day, or for our time, or for our chat.

Go today and say, “Look, I've got all these bad ideas in my mind. I just want to get them out.” When we're sincere, when we empty out all the garbage that we have inside us, that might take an effort.

It might be embarrassing or shameful, but that's when the devil leaves us alone, because now we've used the means.

Sometimes we have to fast and abstain, not just from chocolate or sweets or nice things, but from our anger, from our temper, from our discouragements, from our complaining—it might be exterior or interior—from our judgments, from our resentments, from any bitterness or grudges.

St. Paul says to the Romans: “Do not model your behavior on the contemporary world, but let the renewing of your minds transform you, so that you may discern for yourselves what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and mature” (Rom. 12:2).

We haven't come to live like everybody else. It might be people among our friends or classmates or acquaintances that we know that will earn their salary and they go out and they spend it, or they buy this, or they buy that.

We know that's not the way that God has planned for us. We detach from the material things of the world. Complete detachment. We get a salary; we leave it on the desk of the director. We need to buy something, we consult it.

We pass our judgment through the judgment of somebody else, through the person that has the grace of state. ‘I want to make this phone call or make this trip. I think this thing is really necessary.’ We ask about it.

“Whatever you eat or drink or whatever else you do,” says St. Paul, “do it all for the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31).

When Don Javier was about to have a bypass operation, somebody suggested to him that maybe he should call his sister and tell her he's about to have this bypass. He said: “That's a good idea. Maybe I should do that. I will consult.”

‘I will check if it's necessary.’ ‘I will live that little detail to obedience.’ ‘I will submit my will to the will of another.’ That's what obedience is.

So, we try to mortify our intellect, our curiosity. ‘I don't need to know all things. If I need to know, I will be told. Maybe I don't need to ask too many questions, because perhaps it's not my business.’

Silence can be a great mortification. On the way to the Cross, to a large extent, Christ was silent. Sometimes we need more silence in our life. Mortify our tongue, our curiosity.

We mortify our will through obedience. Things don't have to be done ‘because I want.’

It's a great thing to conquer our will, to tame our will; not just to follow every whim. ‘I've got to go here, I've got to go there, I have to have this, I have to have that.’ ‘I have to watch this TV program, I have to listen to this music, I have to do this, I have to do that.’

Keep our will in check. It can run all over the place. It can lead us to destruction.

We have to mortify our memory. Memory of grievances—what that person said to me ten years ago, wounds we may have acquired in the course of our life. We offer those to Our Lord, and we forget about them.

Mortify our triumphs. ‘When I passed that exam, that was great.’ ‘When I won that medal.’ ‘When I got that compliment.’ Sometimes we need to change the channel in our mind like you change the channel in a radio or a TV station.

We may need to mortify our daydreaming so we don't spend our daydreaming about all sorts of stupid things that may never happen. We live in the real world. It's much more interesting.

We need to mortify our appetites—an appetite for fear, or anger, or anxiety; or a desire for fun, or for excitement; or thoughts of loneliness, or all sorts of other thoughts that the devil might place in our heart or in our mind.

Lord, help me to be beside the Cross like Our Lady was. Help me to be more demanding on myself and less demanding on others.

Help me to bear with joy, for love of Christ, the discomfort, the scarcity of means, all the consequences of real poverty and detachment that I'm called to live.

The extra demands. A time when there might be a little more work someday. Or maybe, it's nine o'clock at night and ‘I'm going to bed and suddenly there's another job that has to be done or something is asked of me.’ The extra demands.

Always more—generosity—professionalism. Responsibility may make a little bit more demands on us…to check that that window is closed, or that door is locked, or all sorts of other things.

Help me to mortify my tongue so that all the words that I say may be words of charity. Kind words that bring joy to the lives of others.

Help me to accept with love, as wanted by God for my growth, all the sufferings, physical and moral, contradictions, misunderstandings, miscommunications, sicknesses, limitations, this headache, that sort throat, all the little things that God may send me.

We have a desire to co-redeem, then all these things will be freely taken up. “Not my will, rather, yours be done” (Luke 22:42).

That desire to co-redeem will lead us not just to accept, but to seek with generosity. To go out of ourselves. Go over and above the call of nature, of justice. Love is active. It goes out and seeks; it doesn't just wait for things to come.

“Be clever,” said St. Josemaría in The Forge, “spiritually clever. Don't wait for the Lord to send you setbacks; go out to meet them with a spirit of voluntary atonement. Then you'll receive them not so much with resignation (an old-sounding word) as with love—aword which is forever young” (J. Escrivá, The Forge, Point 225).

We see a great dynamism in Our Lady’s life. She went into the hill country. She faced the dangers and the risks. She didn't live in the realm of her own comfort. She went out of her way, she stayed with Elizabeth three months—not three hours, not three days, but three months. It was a serious contribution (Luke 1:39,56).

All the time she was forgetting herself—in Bethlehem, in Nazareth, forgetting her own creature comforts. Going to Egypt, accepting the changes of plans, the availability, all of those things that were part of her vocation. She accepted them and lived them joyfully and generously.

We could ask Our Lady, that she might give us that same spirit of self-sacrifice, so that we might live that same spirit in everything, just as she did.

I thank you, my God, for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me during this meditation. I ask your help to put them into practice. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

GD